Sunday, March 22, 2015

There was a time that grief, confusion, distraction--motivated a kind of creative flow within me.
I can remember moments in which I had pure, rabid focus, determined to forget my present circumstances, and delve into a world that I could predict, control.

To craft a sentence that states more than one thing.
To sing a song, which speaks to more than one person.
To make a play that says mouthfuls upon mouthfuls. Words that tell a story, a story that holds meaning.

Today, I stare at half-finished projects, listless resume spaces--unfinished and clumsy songs.
some internal strings have been cut, the hardware is outdated, dusty, ill-fitting.

It is as though
I am standing with my nose nearly touching a painting, unable to see the full picture in front of me. And if I step away, my nearsightedness is so demanding that the whole thing jumbles into patternlessness, it is meaningless.

How do I tell you that it feels as though the whole world is slapping my cheeks and telling me to wake up, get up, starting moving, keep moving, be strong..
And yet.
My first love. My best friend. My father. Gone in less than five years.
~~

Yesterday, I saw a girl that looked like you. Same hair, same clothes, and with a similar manner of speaking.

I thought I was hallucinating, and momentarily wondered if I have finally cracked, tipping the scales of grief and tumbling into a sort of madness.

"excuse me, but you look like someone I used to know"

I discreetly take pictures, seeking confirmation of this fact from far away informants. I am relieved to find some level of commiseration. Deciding that this is not, in fact, a hallucination, makes conversation easier.

"you--actually, you look like someone I know as well",she says.

It is a bricolage of memory-- pieces taken from different inhalations in time.

The now and then smash together for a quick kiss before parting.

In an instant, I am reminded of the time he switched his black hair to white, and the white to black, only to be disappointed that it took me weeks to notice the difference.

we smile at one another, and I think about my past life for a moment longer, before I am flung back into the now. My nose trained, once again, to a dot on the painting.

~~

This too, will not pass.
He too, will never disappear from our lives.

We will carry them on our backs, stacked three high, and our muscles must become stronger. Our throats must learn not to close from sadness. our skin must toughen--it cannot turn to hives any longer. After enough time,there are no more allergic reactions to absence.

But it is an indiscriminate, an unpredictable time.

I do my job, but not much else. I come home. Depress guitar strings, but my father is at finger's reach, and I am quickly fatigued from the stretching.

Tuesday, March 3, 2015

Let's talk about how everyone told us they were "no big deal", essentially "good debt" .
because they went toward expanding our opportunities in adult life.

Let's talk about how they tricked us. They duped us into believing that they could buy us stability, happiness, and the life we always dreamt.

Let's talk about how Student Loans can decide how much you can afford to pay, regardless of residential situation.

Let's talk about the moment you feel like you might be safe, able to save money, able to take a pay cut for a job you like--

--they rear their ugly heads in a stream of anxiety and panic, and quadruple in size.

Let's talk about Sisyphus and his boulder.

Let's talk about how we keep aspirational, low-income Americans stuck in a cycle of debt and disappointment, while the upper-middle class shrugs its shoulders and continues to widen the gap between the haves and have-nots.

let's talk about why I hate unpaid internships.
Let's talk about how truly evil they are.
How they dangle opportunities in front of our faces, only to pull them away at the last moment.
There are no guarantees.

There are no guarantees.

Let's talk about how four years in Ann Arbor got me $30,000 in debt and a job as a glorified secretary at an elementary school.

Meanwhile, my friends ask why I stay in a job where I'm so miserable, where my zest for life went, where my passion and plans flew away to.

they're in my wallet. They're draining out of my wallet. They drain it all, along with 20% of my paycheck.